Octavia's War Read online

  “I don’t recognize him at all,” Octavia said, pulling the see-through black shirt back on and extracting her hair with a casual flick.

  “That’s what I was afraid of,” Bear said. He glanced at them both. “I’ll deal with this carcass. You go and find food and supplies. You were heading north, yes? Across the border?”

  Reluctance to reveal their plans made Ángel clamp his jaw together.

  Octavia nodded. “By foot.”

  “It’s a good plan. You should stick to it,” Bear said. “Go on. I’ll come and find you in a few minutes. Then we need to talk.”

  “Bear…!” Octavia called as he walked off, the body over his shoulder not slowing him down at all.

  Bear turned, still walking, so that he was striding backward. “Call me Remmy,” he said. Then he turned again and strode off around the bushes and out of sight, moving fast.

  Ángel touched Octavia’s shoulder. The contact with her skin, even through the shirt, made his fingers tingle and he wondered for the hundredth time what was happening. It was as though he was sexually attracted to her, even though he wasn’t. Well, not much. Well—

  Tell the truth to yourself at least, Ángel, he reminded himself.

  It was an old habit, telling the truth to himself. There had been no one else in his life for a very long time who he had dared to tell the truth to, which left him alone to hear it. It was the only way he had kept things straight in his head, while playing for time, placating his father and staying alive.

  The truth was, he did want her. He always had. It had only taken him a few days after Severo had brought her back to the compound and installed her in his bedroom for Ángel to figure out Octavia wasn’t what she appeared to be. She portrayed the role well. Once he had started to wonder why she was there, though, watching her closely had convinced him she was not the bimbo everyone else had assumed she was. It was a very careful, well-maintained role but a mask, nevertheless.

  Now he was thinking about it with the eyes of truth, Ángel could acknowledge that the wanting had always been there. He had just refused delivery.

  Now it was in him, wreathing his thoughts, demanding attention in a way that made his body ache and his heart work overtime.

  Was Octavia going to get him killed? Would he be distracted by this and make a deadly error?

  So he touched her shoulder to draw her attention because he couldn’t think of a way to speak that didn’t involve touching her.

  When she looked at him he marveled all over again at the limpid quality of her eyes. They were a proper Mexican black, yet they were a perfect almond shape. A man would mistake her for being a plaything, if he overlooked her firm little chin and the clear line of her jaw. The chin was often up, the eyes narrowed.

  His body warmed at the idea of getting closer to her fiery qualities.

  “Let’s go inside and see what we can find,” he suggested.

  Octavia took a deep breath. Her gaze shifted away from him, as if she needed to be not looking at him to speak. “Yeah, let’s.”

  * * * * *

  Bear stomped into the kitchen and over to the sink to wash his hands. The kitchen seemed to shrink around him, even though his shoulders weren’t as wide as Ángel’s. He was taller, though.

  Octavia lowered the tequila bottle that Ángel had passed to her, watching Bear. Remmy, she corrected herself.

  Ángel ate the last mouthful of tamale and wiped his fingers on the cloth on the table and sat back, his gaze on Bear, too.

  Bear turned and leaned against the sink. “Guess you’ll be having some questions,” he said. His accent was mildly southern, making his voice slow and deep.

  Octavia lifted the bottle and drank deeply. It burned going down and the warmth spread immediately. “I watched you die,” she said flatly. “Ángel buried you. You were really, truly dead. So how the fuck are you standing there?”

  “That’s an easy one,” Bear said. “I didn’t die because I’m dead already.”

  Octavia frowned. That didn’t make any sense at all.

  “You’re not a ghost,” Ángel said flatly.

  “You are right, my friend. I am not a ghost.”

  “Then…?” Octavia prompted.

  “I am a vampire.”

  * * * * *

  Octavia pushed her hair out of her face and reached for the bottle again. It was nearly empty and she had watched Ángel crack the seal, so between them, they had finished the entire thing.

  Ángel pushed the bottle closer to her and she grabbed the neck and drank. Bear —Remmy—had refused to touch the stuff. “I regret, I cannot. At moments like these, a fine drop of whiskey wouldn’t go astray yet even that is beyond me,” he’d said when Ángel had first offered him the bottle.

  So she and Ángel had drunk it themselves.

  “Let me get this straight,” Octavia said. “Ghosts are real. Vampires are real. The things that carved up the men back in Manuel Benavides are from another place beyond Earth. They make Severo look reasonable and sane in comparison and they’re now chasing us. That’s the major points, right?”

  “You’re forgetting the bonding thing,” Ángel added.

  Remmy hadn’t moved from his easy posture against the sink. His arms were still crossed. Just that unmoving stance alone said he was different. A real human would have had to move by now, just to iron out kinks and get the blood moving. He had been standing there for at least an hour. The sun was up and the little kitchen was growing warmer by the minute.

  Octavia brought her mind back to what Ángel had said. She didn’t have to try very hard. Since Remmy had outlined the basics of the trinity thing, she’d had trouble focusing on anything else. Her mind was an eagle, floating high up over the top of prey, watching it, waiting for the moment to strike.

  “We’re supposed to just believe you about this trinity thing?” she said to Remmy, although it was a token protest. As soon as he had mentioned it, something in her had leapt with recognition.

  “I believe him,” Ángel said quietly.

  She looked at him. “Just like that?”

  Ángel shook his head. “It explains everything. Something was happening last night, even this morning. Something neither of us could explain. We weren’t thinking supernatural because it didn’t involve ghosts or woohoo stuff. It was just sex, only it was there and it was taking up all the air around us.”

  Octavia couldn’t keep her gaze on his face. She looked away, not willing to acknowledge that he had put his finger on exactly what had been going on. Ángel’s explanation was precise and elegant. That didn’t mean she had to like it.

  Instead, she looked directly at Remmy. “Can we stop it?”

  “Do you want to?” Ángel asked.

  Octavia’s insides rippled. “Of course I do. This…thing is telling me what to do and worse, it’s telling me how my sex life is going to go from now on. Forever, according to him.” She pointed at Remmy.

  Remmy grimaced and glanced at Ángel. “Octavia has a small issue with people trying to tell her what to do.”

  It seemed to her that something passed between the two men. An understanding.

  Ángel’s expression didn’t change. He just gave a nod.

  “It’s also telling you two what to do. Don’t you resent that? Either of you?”

  Ángel leaned across the table and snagged the tequila bottle. He swirled the last inch around, looking at it. Then he held the bottle out to her.

  Octavia shook her head with an impatient movement.

  Ángel shrugged and swallowed the last of the tequila. He put the bottle back on the table with careful movements and kept his hand around the neck. “I’m not superstitious,” he said. “My mother was, though and she was always of the opinion that the supernatural world paid normal folk no mind until they drew attention to themselves in some way. Then, she said, it was their fault whatever happened after that and complaining about it wasn’t going to change anything.”

  “You think you deserve this?” Oc
tavia said, appalled.

  “I think we got picked for a reason. Maybe, to fight this war that Remmy is talking about, with the…Grimoré?” He looked at Remmy, raising a brow. “Is that right?”

  “Yes, to both. The trinities are army units, designed to fight. They get their strength from the bonding. The sex side of it is just the way the bonding is made permanent.”

  “So even after this war is won, we’re still stuck with each other?” Octavia asked, her horror building.

  “That’s the current thinking, yes,” Remmy said. “No one knows for sure. It’s a first for everyone involved.”

  “And that doesn’t piss you off, Bear?” she asked, her voice rising again. “You’re being pushed into sex with a man and a woman who you barely know and you never get to walk away from it. How can you stand there and look so calm?”

  “That’s the thing,” Remmy said slowly. “I don’t mind. Last night, when I was talking to a friend, the one who said I might be the first of the trinity, I did mind. I minded a whole hell of a parcel. Now…I just don’t.”

  Octavia tried again. She looked at Ángel. “You must surely hate this, Ángel. You’ve spent years trying to carve out a life that wasn’t what your father wanted. Now all that has gone.”

  Ángel gave her an odd little smile. “What makes you think that I might have objections to this? I mean, even if the bonding thing wasn’t pushing us into it?”

  Octavia closed her mouth and sat back. “Oh,” she said softly. She looked at the two of them again. “There was something between the two of you? I mean, before?”

  Bear—Remmy, she corrected herself harshly—shook his head. “Just the potential, that was all. I had my attention taken up by other things.”

  “Like Octavia,” Ángel said softly.

  Remmy gave him a small smile. “As I said.”

  Octavia’s heart squeezed and began to hurt. It was working too hard and all the tequila she had swallowed wasn’t helping. “You’re not talking about being my handler, are you?”

  Remmy drew in a deep breath and let it out. “Nope,” he said, just as softly.

  She stared at him. “You never said anything….”

  “It wouldn’t have been right,” he replied. “You were already depending on me to keep you safe and take care of your rear. Anything else would have been an imposition, under the circumstances.”

  She marveled. All the times she had laid restless in her bed, wondering what it would be like to be held by him, to have him lying over her, then had risen the next day, determined to get her job done and not get dead…. “Wow, does anyone have anything else to confess?” she asked. Her voice was hoarse, scratched by the tequila and stress.

  Remmy got to his feet. “Confession time might have to wait. We shouldn’t stay here. This house belongs to one of Garcia’s men and Severo might think to look here.”

  “I thought you said it was the vampeen things that were chasing us?” Octavia said.

  “Them, too,” Ángel said.

  “As well?” Octavia blew out her breath. “I’m going to go and see if I can find something better to wear than these whore clothes.”

  “Take blankets, too,” Ángel said, making her eyes roll.

  She moved through the upstairs level of the house, looking in all the rooms for anything useful. They were empty, neat and clean and she found nothing until she came to one of the smaller ones. Death metal posters were pinned to the walls and there was an X-Box next to the computer on the desk, a football in the corner of the room and a green and gold León football team scarf hanging over the window.

  There was a pair of hiking boots parked under the bed, the ankle-high leather lifting the edge of the black bed cover.

  Octavia tried them on. They were perhaps a size too big, so she hunted for a pair of socks and found a drawer of them, all neatly rolled.

  There was a denim jacket in the closet that was too broad across the shoulders and too tight around the hips, but it met in the middle and would keep her warm. There was also a drawer full of tank tops and tee-shirts. She sorted through them and found a solid black tank top. Gratefully, she dumped all the jewelry onto the desk next to the X-Box, including the rings on her fingers and the bracelets up her arm. All of it, except for the crucifix that rested beneath all the chains and medallions. It wasn’t much, but the owners of this place could sell it and regain some value for what she was going to take.

  She changed the chiffon top for the black stretch one, then picked up the jacket. As she was leaving the room, she noticed a backpack in the corner, with black marker lettering and doodles all over it.

  She grabbed that, too. It was empty, judging by the lightness of it.

  Ángel was in the master bedroom, standing on the bed, his weight making the thing sag. He had the picture over the top of the bed swung to one side.

  Octavia looked at the combination wheel of the safe he had his hand on. “Don’t tell me you know how to crack one?”

  “I thought I would try it. I can hear it turning. Listen.” He turned the wheel, very slowly.

  Octavia smiled. “You don’t even have your ear to it.”

  “I don’t have to. It’s like birds chittering. I can hear everything.” He gave the wheel one more nudge and let it go. He stared at it.

  “Giving up?” she asked.

  “It’s open,” he said, sounding shocked. He tugged on the handle and the safe door swung open. There was a narrow deposit-box sized space behind and he put his hand into it. The first thing he withdrew was a silver Smith & Wesson 500.

  Octavia held her hand out for it. “I’ve heard of them. Never seen one for real before.”

  “Heavy,” Ángel remarked. “Why would it be in the safe?”

  Octavia broke it open and removed the bullet from the chamber. “This is the most powerful handgun on the market and it was loaded. I’m thinking that the owner of the safe wanted to have some way of fighting back if he was ever forced to open it. Now I want to see what else is in there.”

  Ángel ducked and looked into the little hole. “A lot of cash,” he said.

  “Around these parts, a lot of cash tends to be guarded by a loaded gun, if one is sensible,” Remmy said from the door. “We won’t need cash where we’re going. Take the gun. That could prove useful, by and by.”

  “I’ll look for more bullets,” Ángel said.

  “Try the nightstand,” Octavia suggested.

  He stepped off the bed and opened the drawer on the nightstand and looked at her.

  “People are generally very predictable, when it comes to security stuff,” she said.

  Ángel pulled the box of bullets out with a heavy metallic rattle.

  Octavia looked at Remmy. “I don’t like taking all this stuff. I know we have to, only these folks aren’t the bad guys.”

  “She has a point,” Ángel said.

  Remmy straightened up from his lean against the door and started to unbuckle his watch strap. “This is a vintage 1915 Rolex. Genuine, too. I bought it myself in London, four years before Rolex moved to Geneva.” He put the watch on the dresser next to the door, in the middle where there was nothing but varnished wood. “They could get fifteen thousand for it, if they do their research and realize what it is. Or, we can come back and reclaim the watch later and settle our debts properly.” He raised a brow. “Does that suit you?”

  Octavia nodded, relief touching her.

  “Monsters both human and not are on our tail and you’re worried about taking a few things,” Ángel said, his tone one of amusement.

  “We’re the good guys,” she snapped at him. “If we don’t act like it, then the world starts spinning around the bowl all by itself.”

  Ángel considered her, his amusement gone. “You’re right,” he said softly.

  “You’re going to have to relearn how to behave like a decent human being, I’m guessing,” Remmy told him and now he sounded amused. “You’ve been pretending to be an asshole for far too long.”


  Ángel sucked in a breath and let it out. “Old habits….”

  Octavia could almost feel his awkwardness. He was embarrassed.

  “Food,” she said firmly, tucking the Smith & Wesson into the front pocket of the backpack. “I’m not walking all night and all day without lots of carbohydrates to ease the way.”

  Chapter Five

  They left the house forty minutes later. Octavia’s backpack was filled with food they could eat cold if they needed to and a gallon jug of water.

  “It’s not enough water,” Ángel said. “There might be snow and if there isn’t, we won’t die of thirst, not even if we’re out there for more than three days.”

  “It’s only twenty miles to the border,” Octavia pointed out.

  “That’s if you’re using a map and a ruler, I imagine,” Remmy drawled. Even in Spanish, his accent seemed strong. He hadn’t had the accent before. Octavia realized he had been masking it. Now, he was letting it show.

  “Louisiana?” she asked curiously.

  “Georgia, ma’am.” He tipped an invisible hat at her. “Eighteen oh five. My folk were one of the first families to settle in Savannah.”

  “You lived there all your life?”

  “No, I’m sorry to say. I got itchy feet and followed the Oregon trail into the west, when I was thirty. I never really left the coast once I got there. I just followed my nose slowly south until I arrived here with you good folk.” Remmy picked up a sports bag that was loaded with goods and slung the straps over each shoulder. He made the bag look as if it weighed nothing, only Octavia had seen what Ángel had packed in it.

  Ángel carried another bag, slung over one shoulder. After a mile he put his arms through both handles and hefted it onto his back like a pack, too.

  As they had walked away from the house in the clear, harsh daylight, Remmy had glanced up at the sun and squinted. “Today we’ll walk until the sun is high, then camp until sunset. We’ll walk into the night, as late as we can. Then you’ll sleep tomorrow, once more. We should make it across the Rio by some time tomorrow night if all goes well.”